[Ilnori]
Sitting on his throne and overlooking the crowd before him, Darganth only rarely interrupted as the elves before him discussed the question of how to proceed. Though they had dealt a devastating blow to Arkuns's forces no twenty-four hours earlier, leading to a cheerful atmosphere that lasted a few hours, it didn't take half a day before troubles started appearing again.
At first, it was only a series of small riots by some of the many groups of prisoners the elves had taken after the battle, something that was easily taken care of by the existing guards. And while one of the later attempts at an uprising proved slightly more problematic, ultimately even mana users were at a disadvantage when fighting without equipment.
This proved especially troublesome for the higher rank aura users among the human escapees as they only managed to loot simple steel swords from the low rank and manaless guards they overwhelmed. And as the effect of aura was an enhancement of the affected object and thus partially depended on its quality for the result, these simple weapons designed for use by manaless people and first ranks proved less effective among the fourth rank than simply using fists.
Using the fact that their opponent's weapons couldn't even wound them, the elven reinforcements thus quickly subdued the rioting prisoners again.
But practically at the same time as this was happening, reports of what various dukes and other influential human nobility did in response to their victory started pouring in. Massing their armies, they marched out with the entire military might Arkuns commanded on the central continent.
Apart from a few scattered armies that while as or even more numerous than the one they had faced the day before, lacked in the numbers of high rank soldiers among them, this offensive only consisted of one more army.
But unlike the hastily assembled strike force the duke had led into the forest of Ilnori in the hopes of overwhelming them and achieving a lightning-fast victory, this army not only had an even larger number of high rank mana users but also a far more adequate number of low ranking personnel. From supply wagon drivers to artillery crews, any supporting role for the main force of mythic ranks was present in as large numbers as their empire's war machine could support.
Between the heightened senses of aura users and the varied methods, mages had to scout and communicate, it hadn't even taken three hours after the information arrived for it to spread among the prisoners. With the high expense of doing so, it was simply too costly to block or even just inhibit every mana user's capabilities when reinforcing the walls and fences to endure their attacks was enough for most situations.
As such, while nervousness and unrest spread among the elves, the unrest among the human prisoners only rose.
The difficulties this caused only contributed further to the situation in the meeting Darganth was attending during that time. With the human army's destination unknown there were not many things to base their next action on, leading to seemingly as many differing opinions as there were attendees.
Attentively listening while two men with two such ideas clashed verbally, Darganth's attention only shifted away from them when he noticed the doors at the side of the massive hall open. Turning his head slightly, his mouth curled up into a smile once he saw Torrak and Odylia step into the room.
"Good to see you, I was just starting to hope that you two would soon arrive." Darganth said, earning himself a glare from the elf he interrupted.
"Oh, what's happening?" Torrak asked, letting his eyes wander as he scanned the room.
"A human fleet is sailing toward the westernmost elven forest. But you've mentioned that with your allegiance, every beast lord inhabiting the five seas is mine to command, so I assume something can be done about it."
Nodding with a wide grin, the pair of beasts answered Darganth with utmost confidence.
"Absolutely."
"Then I hope there soon won't be a single ship flying the flag of Arkuns or any of his subordinates left afloat. From what Neandra said that's something right up your alleyway, or?"
"I didn't expect we would get to have some fun this fast, consider it done." Odylia answered, with Torrak nodding in affirmation to her words.
Turning back toward the three elves that had been arguing about just this topic for the past few minutes, Darganth only wordlessly raised an eyebrow.
Under his gaze, two of them deflated, their heads dropping in acceptance. The last one meanwhile only became more agitated, stepping forward and ignoring Darganth. Instead, he looked to Darganth's right where Venrie sat on a throne of her own and addressed her.
"My empress, I hope you're not seriously considering placing the lives of our kind into the hands of beasts? The people of Larnoi and its surrounding forest should be our priority, not some outsiders."
In response to the man's words, a handful voices of support rang out from amid the largely silent crowd. Among them, Darganth overheard the sentence, "Let her fight her own wars." being directed toward Neandra, who sat even further to his right.
Focusing on the disinterested gaze with which she looked across the room for the first time since the meeting began, Neandra's attention narrowed in on the speaker. Showing no emotions on her face and simply looking down at him with a cold disregard, she slowly tapped her fingers on the armrest of her throne as she studied his reaction.
"Oh please, your conflicts with Arkuns are well known. The support of the dragons only proves it even further. You ran to your masters and now they command us around yet continue to hide in their mountains."
Listening to the elf dig himself further into a hole with his words, Neandra caught Venrie's pleading look from the corner of her eye. Pulling back the mana she had already moved toward her arm, she quickly met her gaze to reassure her before turning back to the annoyance in from of them.
Rising from her throne, she silenced the murmuring crowd without a word before locking eyes with the initial speaker.
"As that your position too?" She asked in a tone that made the man opposite of her break out into a sweat.
"Not entirely." He said, his voice nearly faltering under her gaze, "But, at least somewhat, this war is yours, so the risk this army marching to your lands is too. I believe most of us would nonetheless happily help you, but only after securing our own lands. And that is not something we can trust anyone else with, especially someone with their reputation."
Listening to the elf speak Neandra momentarily froze in surprise.
"You didn't lie." She said surprised, her head leaning to the side as she studied him, "I'm impressed, normally people try to say what they believe I want to hear. As a reward, I will spare you the punishment your supporter there will get."
With her words, Venrie raised an arm, causing three massive thorns to erupt from beneath the elf who had interrupted in support of the speaker. Shooting through the mythic rank aura user's enhanced physique as if it were nothing, they cleaved his body into four pieces.
"I allow free discussion in these meetings, but that doesn't mean I will stand for someone insulting my dear." She said, her cold voice a warning to the other assembled elves.
Watching this with a slight smile, Darganth rose from his seat and walked forward a few meters, coming to a stop next to Neandra.
"Now that the interruptions are dealt with I think it is time to make the situation we are in clear to everyone. Arkuns's forces are already marching in all directions, if each of us now rushed to defend their territories our losses would senselessly skyrocket.
The vampires left their cities and entrusted the beasts that remained nearby to protect them in their stead, the naga even marched out with their armies with only the high possibility of the oceanic beasts joining us."
Along with Darganth's words, the murmurs in the hall started again. For many this was the first time they heard of such things, creating a mix of disbelief and surprise among them.
"Well, they were always dependent on outside forces. But we are one of the six great powers, we can defend our own territory. We've done well till now without relying on others, so why should we risk it now?" Someone among the crowd shouted, drawing quite a few murmurs of support.
"For one, because some risk is almost always needed to reach even greater heights. And secondly, because you're wrong. Not just you elves, this whole world has relied on my kind more often than you can deign to imagine. And even right now, while some among you complain about the lack of action on their part, my kind is keeping Arkuns's otherworldly allies from breaching into this world in full force."
To emphasize his words, Darganth abruptly turned around and swung his arm through the air. With it, he tore open a gap in space, revealing a battle of apocalyptic proportions inside the breach.
Thousands of dragons that each could shadow much of, if not the entire central continent swarmed around in one giant host. Their breaths tore through the air with the force to shatter planets behind them, their claws shredded hundreds of their smaller opponents with each swipe, and their scales let all but the most powerful of incoming attacks bounce away harmlessly.
Opposing them was a wide range of beings, all emerging from a massive shell-like sphere of energy and trying to get through the gathered dragons in a suicidal charge. The target of this was Irsys who hovered in place behind the rest of his kin and unleashed a constant barrage of spells and breath attacks onto the sphere before them.
In this battle, even some of the most mighty Locis were wounded, with beams of energy and attacks of all elements but space flying into their lines from their opponents. Especially those bursting forth from the energy sphere proved deadly, tearing off limbs with each hit and, at one point during Darganth's short display, even reaping the life of a Locis who failed to retreat before two more attacks impacted his body.
Closing the spatial rift a couple of seconds later with a crushing motion of his fist, Darganth turned back to the gathered elves. Letting his gaze wander across them, he smiled as he was met with faces of shock and horror.
Amid this, he felt two near-identical telepathic messages from Neandra and Venrie.
'That is what the Locis are experiencing right now?'
'As if I can open a breach toward its core on my own. This was merely some clever theatrics made through illusion magic. Besides, I doubt Irsyr even breached the pocket space by now, that alone will probably take him a few more days. But it was a projection of a past assault on a universe core by the Locis.' Darganth telepathically replied.
Noticing Venrie reluctantly nod in approval to his deception and Neandra reacting to it with a wide grin, Darganth turned back to the crowd.
"With that in mind, can you come to a decision now?" Darganth asked, his words quickly causing the crowd to nod in agreement one by one.
"Good."
Returning to his throne with those words, he sat down with a satisfied smile, confident that the rest of the meeting would proceed much smother than it had up until then.